


everyone we know (is six feet under)

by arbhorwitch



Category: Big Hero 6 (2014)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, gogo is an amazing big sister, hiro is emotionally stunted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-04
Updated: 2015-03-04
Packaged: 2018-03-16 07:09:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3478979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arbhorwitch/pseuds/arbhorwitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A year of firsts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	everyone we know (is six feet under)

**Author's Note:**

> i have so many open word docs and ideas and yet the ones i end up finishing first are, of course, the sad ones 
> 
> warnings for alcohol use, general angst （΄︵◝❀）

_i don't want to rest in peace / i'd rather be the ghost that annoys you / when our lives are over and all that remains / are our skulls and bones let's take it to the grave._

**-skulls** , bastille

//

When the dust settles, when the flashing camera lights and the newspaper articles fade into history, Hiro takes a moment to breathe.

It’s weird, this sensation of nostalgia, and his bedroom walls stare back angry and bright; there’s a ninjas poster by Tadashi’s bed, a circuit-robot clock hanging lonely and crooked by the door, and everything is still in its place but it’s _wrong_ —nothing has moved, nothing has changed, and that’s not right. He’s alone, but not quite; he’s sad, but not as sad as he used to be, as he should be, maybe.

Night comes awkward and fast after that first day. There are two text messages on his phone, one from Honey and one from Wasabi, and the city is saved and Callaghan is behind bars, but there’s no justice in the way he sits in his room with a heavy heart. It doesn’t matter, because Tadashi’s still dead, and his side of the room is still empty, and his chest aches with a solitude he hasn’t let himself feel since the warehouse.

It’s the first night that he accepts, terrible and _sad_ , that his brother is not coming back and his best friend is lost and broken.

*

When he finds the chip, slips it out of the armored fingers, he feels hope flare strong in his blood— _please_ , he thinks savagely, _let me be good enough to rebuild this._

*

Hiro’s a May baby, and though they know his birthday, a part of him hopes that they’ll conveniently forget.

Fifteen is strange, that odd cusp of adolescence, and Baymax doesn’t bring up puberty again but keeps updated scans of him every night when Hiro settles into his desk and works himself into oblivion. There are callouses on his thumbs and small pinprick cuts between the bones of his knuckles, but he calls it the healing process and lets Baymax fret in silence—he’s fine, in the barest sense of the word, and god, he’s trying, honestly.

They don’t forget. The day comes and Cass bakes him a chocolate cake with raspberry filling, delicious and warm, invites everyone over for a small celebration as they sit at the table in the dining room. He doesn’t feel much like celebrating, an awful sort of sadness that rests on his shoulders, because Tadashi’s chair is empty and he’s a whole year older and this time last year, he was singing karaoke with his brother while Cass recorded it on their camera. But they don’t let him sit alone, don’t let him wallow in the what-ifs and the could-haves, the should-haves, because it’s dangerous and Hiro lives and breathes danger; he loves them, hates that he wants to tear himself apart and fix himself.

“I wonder if he’d be proud,” he mumbles into his pillow that night, Baymax charging in the corner, and he gets a soft, “He will always be proud of you, Hiro,” in return.

It hurts, it hurts so _much_ , and when he looks at the empty bed on the other side of the room, he wonders if this is what Tadashi felt the night their parents found a new home six feet under.

*

He chooses an overcast day, dew-wet grass crunching under his sneakers as he shoves his hands into the pockets of his jacket.

It’s warm, smells like early spring—fresh and bright and damp—and he makes his way to the local flower shop downtown. The owner is a family friend, an eccentric older lady with long-lived hands and a calm smile, and she helps him pick out a custom bouquet: carnations, sweet peas, chrysanthemums and yellow camellias that are rich and thick with scent. She ties them tight with a red ribbon and a sad, knowing smile, tucks a strand of grey hair behind her ear and says, “Not today, child,” when he tries to hand her the wad of bills and loose coin.

“But—“

“He would be very pleased, I think,” she murmurs, Japanese accent curling off her tongue, “to know you think of him often.”

His heart is made of something hollow, lungs ash and bone-dust, but he manages a small, “Thank you, Ms. Matsumoda.”

“Give him my hello.” She places the bouquet in his shaking hands, folds his fingers over the pink-white paper. “Give him my thanks.”

“I will,” he assures, bowing gratefully; she kisses him once on the cheek, shoos him out the door and into the streets. The sun is trying to peek through the overhang above, casting a washed-out grey over the city, and his phone has been buzzing with messages all day but he can’t bring himself to look.

He’ll make up his Thursday classes later, maybe offer an explanation to his friends, but right now—cold and sad and alone—he trudges on.

*

He hates cemeteries.

He hates the tombstones, the well-walked paths that are etched in the dirt and soil in misery, the way the flowers grow loose and unbidden over the graves of the dead like broken prayers. Hiro’s not always sure what he believes in, finds solace in taking apart science in the corner of his garage, but he hopes to _something_ that Tadashi isn’t alone, that he’s happy.

His grave is beside their parents, of course. He can remember the day perfectly, the rain and the arm around his shoulders holding him together for just a bit longer, and he follows the road to the section near the south entrance where the stones are scattered and few. Up the hill, his feet sinks into the mud, and the bouquet nearly slips out of his hands, but he makes it—there’s a sturdy tree standing tall and proud, and he rests his weight against the roots and reminds himself how to breathe.

It’s too real, this pain of his; it’s the first time he’s visited since the procession and he’s _dying_.

“God,” he whispers, a plea, maybe, “ _God_ , I should have come sooner, I’m sorry.”

The silence is deafening; he pushes himself up, walks over slowly, and falls to his knees.

“I’m apologizing to a piece of rock,” he says, and then it hits him: it doesn’t matter what he says here, doesn’t matter what he throws to the wind, because no one else will hear.

So it goes, mud-stained and exhausted:

“I really fucking miss you, you know. It’s like… I’m trying, and most of the time it’s fine. School is pretty cool, and your—our—friends are awesome, but I’m not a replacement. I don’t want to replace you. It was supposed to be you and me, and now it’s just me, and I don’t know how to do all of this alone. Trying, though.”

He takes a deep breath, looks up, feels his eyes burning anyway; they’re stinging something awful, and his fingers are clutched so tightly around the stems he’s afraid he might snap them. He’s not built for this awkward grief.

“Okay, so maybe you can hear me, maybe you can’t, but I never really told you this enough when you were alive and this is probably the only chance I’ll get to say it. I love you, and I’m gonna love you until the day I die, and you never let me down. Sorry that I couldn’t save you. Sorry that you don’t get to see your twenty-first birthday. I’m sorry, because I don’t know how else to make this go away.”

Sorry for the blood on his hands, sorry for the space between his fingers.

“It sucks that you’re gone.”

He waits for a sign, some miracle from the fairy tales that his voice has reached the infinite plane his brother’s resting on, but there’s nothing, just an echo of waking birds and the beginning of a storm in the distance, and—that’s okay.

Hiro continues to kneel, tucks the flowers in the crevice between the stone and the grass, and lets the silence settle in the depth of his bones.

*

“I can’t do this,” he says, four months post-everything, buried in scattered notes on photonics and aerial robotics and the fall of the Roman Empire. “I’m gonna fail.”

“The chances of you failing are two percent,” Baymax states, waddling over and draping himself over Hiro. He notices dully, belatedly, that he’s cold, that the garage floor is ice against the soles of his feet and his hands have been shaking for the last two hours, either from nerves or caffeine. Baymax has kept his silence, his concerns, and Hiro’s eternally grateful for it—but he’s also eternally grateful for the heat seeping through his t-shirt and warming him from the inside out, the gentle robot settled weightlessly against him. “I suggest a full night’s sleep to decrease your stress levels.”

“Midterms are this week,” he explains. Baymax can’t sigh, but Hiro can imagine it. “’Sides, GoGo’s already given me the sleep lecture.”

“You have not slept properly in thirteen days,” Baymax tells him. Hiro clicks his tongue against his teeth, drags his hand through his bangs. “You need to rest, Hiro.”

“I will, buddy,” he murmurs distractedly, but his eyes are sore and his back aches where he’s been crouched over his desk. “Just—fifteen more minutes, okay? Fifteen minutes and I’ll take a nap on the couch.”

“Twenty minutes,” Baymax offers; Hiro startles, cranes his neck to look at the robot. “Followed by a comfortable sleep in your bed.”

Of course—of course, because this is his brother’s blood, sweat, and soul, this is five months’ worth of friendship, and he can’t fault Baymax for learning to adapt, to adjust. They make a strange pair, the two of them; Hiro laughs, loud and desperately afraid, and Baymax warms just a bit more to keep him comfortable. He remembers the bedtime stories as a child, his mother’s soft voice and Tadashi’s quiet giggles, and he’s tired and overwhelmed but this—this is what his life is, and it’s less about trying now, more about the way he wakes up in the morning without the knot of anxiety tied around his ribcage.

“It’s a deal,” he says eventually, wiping the tears gathered at the corner of his eyes. “GoGo’s never gonna let me live this down.”

*

It’s bound to happen—they’re small and not always prepared, not always ready to react, and Honey hits the ground hard and fast and doesn’t move.

Hiro’s felt panic before, knows what it feels like to be choked by his own hand, and he jumps off Baymax long before they’ve landed and he’s running, feet hitting the cement; if she dies, if Honey dies, he’s—he can’t think, can’t entertain the thought, because he refuses to lose anyone else, he _can’t_.

“Honey, oh my god Honey,” and her chest is rising and falling and he should have reinforced her armor more, should have tested maximum damage because her helmet’s chipped and cracking. He can hear Baymax’s scanners, hears him say, “She is suffering from a severe concussion and two of her ribs are broken. Immediate medical attention is required.”

He picks her up, a ragdoll in his arms, tucks her against his chest. Hiro looks up, looks a mess, probably, and Baymax adds, “I am the fastest transportation.”

“Okay,” he nods, hands useless at his side. “I’ll—we’ll meet you at the hospital, okay, just go.”

He speaks over their comms, swallowing past the lump in his throat when he says, “Baymax is on route to the hospital, Honey’s alive, she’s alive.”

“ _Hiro, where are you?_ ” GoGo asks, the most nervous he’s ever heard her.

“By the bank, back exit. It’s where, um, he was headed this way, but I think he got away?”

“We caught the bastard,” Fred croaks, anger thick in his voice. “Wasabi has him right now.”

Hiro nods again, realizes no one is around to see it until GoGo speeds around the corner. She holds out her hands and he doesn’t hesitate, lets her hook his arms around her shoulders and ensures that he’s holding on tight enough for her to move—and then they’re off, half of her usual pace but fast enough to slip through the backstreets without stopping. They’re twelve minutes away from the hospital and Baymax has probably already made it, has probably checked her in and she’s fine, she’s absolutely fine, has to be.

She has to be; GoGo says, “Stop worrying, Hiro. She’s survived explosions ten times worse,” and he laughs until he’s wheezing against her back in thick gulps of air that can’t reach his lungs.

*

Eight months and it’s Tadashi’s twenty-first birthday, and Hiro’s only fifteen and sort of sad, sort of lonely.

He and Cass don’t celebrate, but they sit and watch terrible soap operas that she used to watch with Tadashi; most of the day is spent under a blanket on the couch, a rare day that the café is closed.

“I think he would have gone out tonight,” Cass mumbles eventually, Hiro’s head on her shoulder and his hand interlocked with hers. It’s easier to share the misery, easier than being alone in a too-big, ghostless apartment. “He’d be a _terrible_ drunk.”

Hiro chuckles, says, “I think he got drunk at least once. I dunno how else to explain Baymax’s low battery settings.”

Baymax, who’s upgrading in Hiro’s bedroom, because Hiro loves him but today is hard enough and he has a plan of action, has a way to banish the lingering ache in his veins after his aunt retires for the night. Cass laughs, quiet and gentle, before giving up on following the storyline of their latest drama; he doesn’t blame her when she scoots off the couch, pops in a Blu-ray of _Jurassic Park,_ and locates a bag of caramel popcorn that she pours into a bowl for the two of them. It’s sometime after six, and the weather is drowsy with a three-day storm that has yet to let up. Flood warnings occasionally flash on his phone, texts from Fred that if anyone needs a place to crash, his doors are open; Hiro hopes they’re together today, that they’re not alone, because he’s not the only one missing a part of him.

“Thanks, Aunt Cass,” he says, and she shushes him, kisses the top of his head.

*

Cass doesn’t drink often, but she has a stash that Hiro probably shouldn’t know about.

He takes two bottles: an entire bottle of a mix for long island iced tea, and a weirdly shaped thing of rum that hasn’t been touched in years. He grabs a can of soda and a glass on his way back upstairs, a quiet trek to avoid waking up his aunt, and he shuts his door and leans against it with guilt churning in his stomach.

Hiro doesn’t do this sort of thing, doesn’t care for the rebellion of teenage abuse, but Tadashi would have been twenty-one and that’s a big fucking deal, that’s _huge_ , and it’s incredibly unfair that he can’t even celebrate it because he’s dead—it kills Hiro, destroys eight months of Progress, and he cracks open the mixed bottle before he can think about it anymore. It smells awful, regret and terrible life decisions, but he fills the glass halfway before diluting it with the soda.

Deep breath, and then he’s swallowing it, burning as it goes down and it tastes _horrible_ , the alcohol foreign and disgusting on his tongue. He’s not sure if his throat will ever heal from that, coughing and spluttering as silent as he can when he pours himself another glass.

Just as terrible as the first, a little less of a burn though; his hands start to feel numb and he has the urge to use the bathroom, but his third glass follows in the same fashion until he has no soda left and his tongue is heavy in his mouth.

Drinking it straight is a mistake; it’s the worst thing he’s ever tasted, and he’s not sure how people can do this on a nightly basis, even as he pours himself a fifth glass. It’s not long before he’s shakily putting the lid back on the dwindling bottle and attempting to stand, only to jerk forward and nearly fall. He uses the wall as support, pulls his phone out of his sweater—his hands aren’t cooperating, his body is lead—and shoots a text to who he thinks might be GoGo about his scientific findings on his alcohol experiment. By the time he stumbles to his bed, the bottles lay forgotten on the floor and his face is pleasantly numb.

“Ow,” he says, because he doesn’t want to be alone anymore, the silence suffocating him. There’s a _whirr_ near his desk and Baymax inflates, immediately scanning Hiro and squeaking his way over.

“My scan indicates your blood alcohol content is currently 0.16%,” he begins, and Hiro’s pretty sure he hears concern and disappointment, or maybe he’s just imagining it, imagining that it’s Tadashi looking over him with a worried frown because his little brother has the audacity to get _drunk_. “Your senses are greatly impaired. Sleep is the best course of action.”

“Don’t wanna sleep,” he slurs, typing out another message on his phone—this time to Wasabi, or Honey, he can’t tell. “Jus’ lonely.”

“It is Tadashi’s birthday,” Baxmax states, and Hiro nods, waves his hands above his head and counts the glow-in-the-dark stars stickered to his ceiling. Tadashi’s handiwork, years old but too nostalgic for Hiro to care. 

“Yup,” he adds belatedly, brows furrowing as the stars blur around the edges. Baymax is quiet, assessing, and Hiro licks his lips and tries to work out the messages on his phone; Wasabi is confused and GoGo is firing text after text, asking him to explain, _what the fuck hiro what did you do_ , and he laughs until his ribs ache with melancholy and his lungs burn fierce in his chest. His fingers are strange, don’t quite work the way he intends, but he manages to hit the call button and holds the device up to his ear to listen to the ringing.

Twice. She picks up, says, “ _Hiro, what’s going on?_ ”

“Baymax says I’m drunk,” he admits, but GoGo doesn’t find it amusing. “GoGo, he’s twenty-one. Did—d’you think he ever drank?”

She’s silent for a few seconds, and he’s half afraid she’ll hang up on him, but then she murmurs, “ _Once. We were in Honey’s apartment after second semester midterms and we had a bit too much. He said something about codes and pulled out his laptop. S’all I remember from that night._ ”

It makes sense, makes him painfully aware of the little things he never knew about his brother; fourteen years with, the rest without, and he says, “GoGo, I think I’m sad.”

“ _I know you are_ ,” she replies easily, and Baymax trots over and sits on the edge of the bed, places his hand on Hiro’s forehead and Hiro leans into the touch. “ _Drinking isn’t gonna make the pain go away, trust me._ ”

“I never wanted it to,” he warbles, sniffling into the soft vinyl and squeezing his eyes shut. The world is spinning too fast and his nose is running and Baymax merely offers comfort in the only way he knows how. “I jus’—he’s dead. He’s dead, and m’over it, but it’s his _birthday_. We used to have a party, used to… he’s gone, isn’t he?”

“ _You’ll be fine_ ,” she answers with instead, and she sounds so calm, soothing, and he’s never heard this side of her but he loves her more for it, loves her like his blood is made of infinities. “ _Hey, Hiro?_ ”

He hums, taps out one-two-three on his stomach with his free hand.

“ _Next time, call me first._ ”

Hiro laughs, laughs until he can feel his throat constricting and then he’s sobbing into his phone, his last lifeline, his final call—GoGo doesn’t ask, doesn’t hang up, and his eyes burn and he’s pretty sure he’s going to wake up with a killer hangover, pretty sure he’s gonna vomit before he even makes it that far, but Tadashi is dead and that’s all that matters in this moment. Tadashi is dead, and the room is terrifyingly void of his brother’s laughter, and everything hurts in ways he never knew possible and he’s _tired_. 

“M’sorry,” he mumbles, rolling onto his side so his phone is trapped between ear and pillow. Baymax pulls the blanket up over his shivering body, roots through Hiro’s mess under his desk until he finds a suitable bucket that Hiro doesn’t remember having. “GoGo, I think I’m gonna throw up.”

“ _No shit_ ,” she laughs. “ _Go ahead, I’ll still be here when you’re done._ ”

Baymax is already prepared, trading the bucket for his phone, and he’s retching until his stomach is empty of the last hour; he’s sweating, his hands have yet to stop trembling, and his throat feels permanently damaged. Baymax helps him shrug out of his sweater when he’s done, hands him a paper cup full of water that he must have filled while Hiro was throwing up his mistakes, and he drinks it slowly.

“You need to sleep,” Baymax tells him, tucking him back in once he’s settled. “This night will not seem so bad in the morning.”

He reaches for his phone, says to both of them with a gravelly voice, “I really fucked up tonight.”

“ _You did_ ,” GoGo agrees, while Baymax simply replies with, “It is understandable, although I highly recommend refraining from repeating this in the future.”

She’s subdued when she says, “ _Hiro, you know you can talk to us, right?_ ” and he confesses, “I could’ve—should’ve saved him.”

He’s neglected to mention that detail in the past few months, because he’s learned to live with the guilt on the occasional night it flares up; logically, he knows he’s tricked himself into believing he failed his brother, and it’s rotting in his muscles and his organs, eating him from the inside out. He thinks about shells, thinks about vengeance, thinks about the superhero business and the scar on his left calf from a knife that found its way into his flesh.

“ _Don’t do that_ ,” GoGo says eventually, firm and steady. “ _You’re only human. What Tadashi did, what happened that night? It was really fucking unfortunate, but if there’s one thing I know about this screwed up reality, it’s that you can’t take credit for what the universe does._ ”

 His voice is tinny and so, so small when he mumbles, “Then why does the universe hate me?”

“ _Hiro,_ ” she sighs, not unkindly, and he’s not going to live this down but he’s still sort of drunk and GoGo’s amazing. “ _Sleep, kiddo. I’ll stay on the line as long as you want._ ”

A brief glance at his clock tells him it’s four in the morning, and he’s managed to not wake up his aunt which is an incredible feat. He gestures for Baymax to lay down so he can use him as a pillow.

The rain is going strong outside, a constant patter against the pane of his window, and the stars on his ceiling are fading and worn—he’s probably never going to be able to bring himself to touch the hollowness that separates his side from Tadashi’s, but Gogo’s breathing evenly on the other line, typing away at something, and Baymax is warm under his head and it doesn’t seem so terrible. The universe is vast and awful tonight; he’s insignificant in the wake of gravity, and someday, maybe, he’ll forget the pain, forget that he attempted to drown something so intangible in bitter vodka.

“I survived his first birthday,” he tells them both. “M’alive, and he’s not, but that’s—it’s okay.”

When he sleeps, it’s dreamless.

*

(Cass finds him passed out the next morning, finds the half-empty bottle and the untouched rum, and she doesn't mention it—can't bring herself to open fresh wounds. She leaves two ibuprofen on his nightstand with a fresh glass of water, smiles sadly at Baymax, and hopes to hell and back that Hiro will be okay.)

*

Here’s the thing:

The first year is the hardest, an excess of _firsts_ , and he keeps a tally in his journal—first day, first night, first week, first month, first class, first birthdays. He’ll take it to the grave, the way he counts the first injury, first test, first semester of university without his brother to guide him, so many _firsts_ , a reminder of how to live.

He never quite heals, never quite recovers, but the devastation is less like the overwhelming sensation of _nothing_ after twelve months; they stand in a semi-circle on the hill, and Hiro knows Tadashi is listening, watching. He’s spent too much time wishing for a way to revive the dead, a way to cheat the universe, and not enough time teaching himself to move on. Honey has her arm around his shoulders and GoGo stands sturdy at his side, gum cracking between her teeth; Wasabi and Fred organize the white tulips along the edge of the stone with assistance from Baymax and his keen eye for perfection, and Cass walks up behind Hiro, lets him rest his head on the curve of her collarbone.

Here lies Tadashi Hamada, Hiro thinks, here lies his heart and soul and so, so much more.

**Author's Note:**

> flower meanings if you're interested! most are the japanese meaning behind them: 
> 
> carnation - love
> 
> sweet pea - goodbye 
> 
> yellow camellia - longing 
> 
> white chrysanthemums - death, grief, truth (also the meaning in western cultures)
> 
> white tulip - forgiveness 
> 
> [♥](http://http://arbhorwitch.tumblr.com)


End file.
